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President Clinton commented to Chris Wallace that 'conservatives' and 'neo cons' opposed and ridiculed his efforts to catch/kill Bin Laden. This contention has gone un examined by the MSM, they just dutifully report his comments,

Were his comments true or just more CYA BS?

Here are comments from republicans and neo cons at the time:

from Newt Gingrich 8-20-96
"Well, I think the United States did exactly the right thing. We cannot allow a terrorist group to attack American embassies and do nothing. And I think we have to recognize that we are now committed to engaging this organization and breaking it apart and doing whatever we have to to suppress it, because we cannot afford to have people who think that they can kill Americans without any consequence. So this was the right thing to do."

CNNÃ¢â¬â¢s Candy Crowley reported on August 21, 1998, the day after cruise missiles were sent into Afghanistan:

With law makers scattered to the four winds on August vacation, congressional offices revved up the faxes. From the Senate majority leader [Trent Lott], Ã¢â¬ÅDespite the current controversy, this Congress will vigorously support the president in full defense of AmericaÃ¢â¬â¢s interests throughout the world.Ã¢â¬

Ã¢â¬ÅThe United States political leadership always has and always will stand united in the face of international terrorism,Ã¢â¬ said the powerful Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee [Jesse Helms].

The Atanta Journal-Constitution reported the same day:

Ã¢â¬ÅOur nation has taken action against very deadly terrorists opposed to the most basic principles of American freedom,Ã¢â¬ said Sen. Paul Coverdell, a Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Ã¢â¬ÅThis action should serve as a reminder that no one is beyond the reach of American justice.Ã¢â¬

Former vice president Dan Quayle was quoted by CNN on August 23, 1998:

I donÃ¢â¬â¢t have a problem with the timing. You need to focus on the act itself. It was a correct act. Bill Clinton tookÃ¢â¬âmade a decisive decision to hit these terrorist camps. ItÃ¢â¬â¢s probably long overdue.

Richard Perle, wrote the following in an August 23, 1998, op-ed published in the Sunday Times:

"For the first time since taking office in 1993, the Clinton administration has responded with some measure of seriousness to an act of terror against the United States. This has undoubtedly come as a surprise to Osama Bin Laden, the Saudi terrorist believed to have been behind the bombing of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and to the regimes in Afghanistan and Sudan who provide him with sanctuary and support.

Until now they, along with other terrorists and their state sponsors in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya and North Korea, have manoeuvred, plotted, connived and killed with confidence that the United States would do little or nothing in retaliation.

So ThursdayÃ¢â¬â¢s bombing is a small step in the right direction. More important, it reverses, at least for now, a weak and ineffective Clinton policy that has emboldened terrorists and confirmed that facilitating terror is without cost to the states that do it. "

So Clinton continues as the master politican, wagging his finger and lying.

IMO this was a caculated gambit to raise hos visibility among the left wing base and help Hillary who has been falling out of favor with the base.

IMO this was a brillant move from a master politican and connsumate liar & revisionist.

It's the whole wag the dog issue. Remember that? Every time Clinton did anything, there was a chorus of conservatives questionning his motives. They obviously weren't telling him to do more.

Rep. Dick Armey, GOP Majority Leader
"The suspicion some people have about the president's motives in this attack [on Iraq] is itself a powerful argument for impeachment," Armey said in a statement. "After months of lies, the president has given millions of people around the world reason to doubt that he has sent Americans into battle for the right reasons."

Rep. Gerald Solomon (R - NY)
"It is obvious that they're (the Clinton White House) doing everything they can to postpone the vote on this impeachment in order to try to get whatever kind of leverage they can, and the American people ought to be as outraged as I am about it," Solomon said in an interview with CNN. Asked if he was accusing Clinton of playing with American lives for political expediency, Solomon said, "Whether he knows it or not, that's exactly what he's doing."

Sen. Dan Coats
Coats, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a statement, "While there is clearly much more we need to learn about this attack [on Osama bin Laden] and why it was ordered today, given the president's personal difficulties this week, it is legitimate to question the timing of this action."

Sen. Larry Craig, U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee
The foregoing review of the Clinton Administration's prevarications on Kosovo would not be complete without a brief look at one other possible factor in the deepening morass. Consider the following fictional situation: A president embroiled in a sex scandal that threatens to bring down his administration. He sees the only way out in distracting the nation and the world with a foreign military adventure. So, he orders his spin-doctors and media wizards to get to work. They survey the options, push a few buttons, and decide upon a suitable locale: Albania.

The foregoing, the premise of the recent film Wag the Dog, might once have seemed farfetched. Yet it can hardly escape comment that on the very day, August 17, that President Bill Clinton is scheduled to testify before a federal grand jury to explain his possibly criminal behavior, Commander-in-Chief Bill Clinton has ordered U.S. Marines and air crews to commence several days of ground and air exercises in, yes, Albania as a warning of possible NATO intervention in next-door Kosovo. . . .

Not too many years ago, it would not have entered the mind of even the worst of cynics to speculate whether any American president, whatever his political difficulties, would even consider sending U.S. military personnel into harm's way to serve his own, personal needs. But in an era when pundits openly weigh the question of whether President Clinton will (or should) tell the truth under oath not because he has a simple obligation to do so but because of the possible impact on his political "viability" -- is it self-evident that military decisions are not affected by similar considerations? Under the circumstances, it is fair to ask to what extent the Clinton Administration has forfeited the benefit of the doubt as to the motives behind its actions.

GOP Activist Paul Weyrich
Paul Weyrich, a leading conservative activist, said Clinton's decision to bomb on the eve of the impeachment vote "is more of an impeachable offense than anything he is being charged with in Congress."

Wall St. Journal Editorial Board
"It is dangerous for an American president to launch a military strike, however justified, at a time when many will conclude he acted only out of narrow self-interest to forestall or postpone his own impeachment"

Sen. Trent Lott, GOP Majority Leader
"I cannot support this military action in the Persian Gulf at this time," Lott said in a statement. "Both the timing and the policy are subject to question."

Rep. Gerald Solomon (R-NY)
"Never underestimate a desperate president," said a furious House Rules Committee Chairman Gerald B.H. Solomon (R-N.Y.). "What option is left for getting impeachment off the front page and maybe even postponed? And how else to explain the sudden appearance of a backbone that has been invisible up to now?"

Rep. Tillie Folwer (R-Fla)
"It [the bombing of Iraq] is certainly rather suspicious timing," said Rep. Tillie Fowler (R-Florida). "I think the president is shameless in what he would do to stay in office."

Phyllis Schlafly, Eagle Forum
First, it [intervention in Kosovo] is a "wag the dog" public relations ploy to involve us in a war in order to divert attention from his personal scandals (only a few of which were addressed in the Senate trial). He is again following the scenario of the "life is truer than fiction" movie Wag the Dog. The very day after his acquittal, Clinton moved quickly to "move on" from the subject of impeachment by announcing threats to bomb and to send U.S. ground troops into the civil war in Kosovo between Serbian authorities and ethnic Albanians fighting for independence. He scheduled Americans to be part of a NATO force under non-American command.

Jim Hoagland, Washington Post
"President Clinton has indelibly associated a justified military response ... with his own wrongdoing. ... Clinton has now injected the impeachment process against him into foreign policy, and vice versa"

Byron York, National Review
Instead of striking a strong blow against terrorism, the action [launching cruise missles at bin Laden] set off a howling debate about Clinton's motives. The president ordered the action three days after appearing before the grand jury investigating the Monica Lewinsky affair, and Clinton's critics accused him of using military action to change the subject from the sex-and-perjury scandal â the so-called "wag the dog" strategy.

Wall St. Journal editorial
"Perceptions that the American president is less interested in the global consequences than in taking any action that will enable him to hold onto power [are] a further demonstration that he has dangerously compromised himself in conducting the nation's affairs, and should be impeached"

Document those lies. You are way out of touch with reality once again. Documents, official documents prove everything he said. In fact, I posted the Cole situation several times as to how it was handed to Bush on a platter and he DID NOTHING and opened the door for 9/11 to happen.,

I posted it here, months ago, long before Clinton finally made it public yesterday.

And then there was Somalia, and the official transcripts from th floor of the House of Representatives...or perhaps those arent official enough documents for you. Maybe something in Arabic would suit you better?????

NEM ... you are the history rewriting moron here. Bush made the crucial mistake of keeping Clinton's CIA director Tenet. Clinton was calling shots while Bush was President so that Bush would not discover all the cover-ups by the Clinton Admin.

NEM ... you are the history rewriting moron here. Bush made the crucial mistake of keeping Clinton's CIA director Tenet. Clinton was calling shots while Bush was President so that Bush would not discover all the cover-ups by the Clinton Admin.

I remember the wag the dog argument well, I think now that it is in a different perspective there is a tendency by the righties to rewrite history.. I think it would have been in Rove's right wing theocracy best interest to just leave Clinton alone, but it seems that Rice has come back today and this may continue up to the November elections.

...Bush made the crucial mistake of keeping Clinton's CIA director Tenet. Clinton was calling shots while Bush was President so that Bush would not discover all the cover-ups by the Clinton Admin...

Click to expand...

So Clinton got his own little Manchurian thing going then? Tell me something, is he still in pseudo-power today? Did he use some sort of mind-control beam to get Bush to keep key people in authority? And did he get this mind control beam from Dr Evil?

Don't ever make a 'tin-foil-hat' reference about anyone else here again FBN, 'cause if you do that little bumble of a statement you're already probably wishing you never said is gonna get dropped in your lap.

NEM ... you are the history rewriting moron here. Bush made the crucial mistake of keeping Clinton's CIA director Tenet. Clinton was calling shots while Bush was President so that Bush would not discover all the cover-ups by the Clinton Admin.

Click to expand...

Do you have an iota of evidence to back up your latest conspiracy theory?